Yesterday ancient astronaut theorist Mike Bara endorsed an unconfirmed report made by a rightwing blog quoting anti-Islamic German blogger Michael Mannheimer that Germanwings pilot Andreas Lubitz had converted to Islam and therefore crashed his plane, killing 149 people and himself, as part of a jihadist act. Mannheimer offered no evidence other than the existence of a mosque in Bremen, where Lubitz had trained as a pilot. Bara posted to Facebook that the German blog post was “proof of what we all knew 3 days ago.” His brother Dave replied with a conspiracy theory that world governments would attempt to suppress the truth about Islamic suicide pilots. As of today, French and German prosecutors have not released any evidence indicating Lubitz was Muslim, while media reports indicate that he crashed the plane after experiencing mental health problems.

Mannheimer, who has called Islam a “thousand year crime against Germany,” has since removed the blog post, which had received heavy criticism. Nevertheless, Bara doubled down on his endorsement last night, claiming that depression and mental illness were not a sufficient explanation for Lubitz’s actions: “You don’t murder 150 people because you’re depressed. You eat a whole tub of ice cream maybe.” Bara’s endorsement of anti-Islamic claims reveals not only a disturbing level of underlying bigotry and offensive levels of ignorance, but also his slipshod approach to “research.”

Mike Bara annoys me, though not just for the reasons you think. It’s not just that he’s another in a long line of bigoted idiots who somehow get paid to star in TV shows pandering to conspiracy theorists and racists, but that he can move through fringe circles with such impunity. Bara is a regular on Ancient Aliens, currently airing on H2 and about to resume airing on History on April 10. At the same time, he also is the paid star of Uncovering Aliens on the rival Discovery networks (the show aired on Animal Planet and the Science Channel). Yet neither network objects to Bara using the Ancient Aliens name not just to promote himself but as an integral part of his “work.” Bara has titled each of his recent books Ancient Aliens and something or another. His newest is Ancient Aliens & Secret Societies. Now, you will recall that H2’s parent company, A+E Networks, ordered me to cease and desist from publishing a book that didn’t even share the same title with America Unearthed for fear of “confusion,” yet A+E Networks has raised no objection to Bara flagrantly cashing in on their intellectual property—A+E Networks owns the trademark on the phrase Ancient Aliens. Perhaps that will change now the A+E Networks has promoted the head of programming for H2 to a new position. According to Deadline, Paul Cabana, the executive responsible for paranoid and angry programming like America Unearthed, Brad Meltzer’s Lost History, and America’s Book of Secrets, has been bumped up to oversee programming at both H2 and the larger History channel. We can look forward, I suppose, to the further sensationalizing of the larger network, though it remains to be seen how Cabana hopes to marry H2’s New Age conspiracy brand to History’s conservative Bible-thumping version of fringe nuttiness. On another note, although I didn’t want to discuss this again, I feel that I need to document an ongoing situation with Scott Reaney, the Canadian blogger who accused me of stealing public domain material from his blog about the skeletons of giants, in case it escalates. Since I wrote about him, Reaney has continued on a campaign of harassment, sending me vulgar emails and posting libelous statements on his website asserting that I am a pedophile and a supporter of ISIS. I sent Reaney a cease and desist letter demanding he remove the libelous comments, which has provoked Reaney into making promises that he is preparing further harassment:

You are a nutless wonder... and if you got your panties in a knot regarding your inability to grasp those simple ideas, I guarantee that you will have a bona fide shit tsunami for what is coming your way, Huckleberry. I will continue to display the 'sordid details' concerning your multitude of character flaws, beginning April 1st.

As I am sure you know, I have never met Scott Reaney. I made the unfortunate error of replying politely to his first email to me (as ( try to do with everyone who emails me), and this is the thanks I get.

I’m sure that most readers will have already come to a conclusion about Reaney that I cannot legally write, and I am saddened that I have somehow ended up the focus of Reaney’s ire, for (this time) “lying” about nineteenth century people who are not able to defend themselves by dint of being dead. Let’s end on a happier note as we return to Ancient Aliens. After learning this morning that History plans to mark the 150th anniversary of the end of the Civil War with a special Ancient Aliens called “Aliens and the Civil War,” set to air on the main History channel April 10, I came across this rather humorous satire of the Ancient Aliens worldview in which columnist Donnie Johnson professes to have “discovered” thanks to a marathon viewing of Ancient Aliens that his feelings of sluggishness were due not to working three 14-hour days but rather due to an infestation of aliens.

As someone who suffers from severe depression, I feel entitled to say: Fuck Mike Bara and fuck Michael Mannheimer. (I mean, I would have said it anyway, but this time I feel more entitled that usual.)

By the way, this should clear up why Thorwald Franke's interest in Islam is a red flag (especially combined with his need to insist that Goethe is totally not responsible for the Holocaust, you guys!).

On a related note, Ernest Hemingway totally wasn't depressed. If he were, he would have just eaten ice cream.

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EP

3/28/2015 07:11:17 am

I mean, it's likely that his mental problems went beyond depression, but that's not to say that depression wasn't a necessary condition of him crashing the plane...

Anyway, fuck Mike Bara (did I mention that?).

Cathleen Anderson

3/28/2015 07:48:01 am

Depression and other 'mental health' issues are a whole lot more complicated than that Shane. I suggest you do some more research before you say something even stupider than that comment.

Cathleen Anderson

3/28/2015 07:50:01 am

Shane, depression, and for that matter any other 'mental illness' is a whole more complicated than your extremely stupid and offensive statement about ice cream.

There was I time when I would have agreed with you, but you are so very, very wrong.

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Shane Sullivan

3/28/2015 08:06:52 am

Just to clear up any confusion, the quote “You don’t murder 150 people because you’re depressed. You eat a whole tub of ice cream maybe.” was from Mike Bara. Yes, it is incredibly stupid, and I hoped to point that out with the thing about Hemingway.

I apologize if anyone was offended by the observation that Mike Bara's rotund face has the appearance of someone who routinely eats entire tubs of ice cream. Except Mike Bara, who deserves to be offended.

(I also have a history of depression, and what he said was quite ignorant.)

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Joseph Craven

3/28/2015 12:04:21 pm

Every family who's ever lost someone to suicide should be entitled to a free swing with a ratan cane against Mike Bara's ass.

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Bob Jase

3/28/2015 06:24:13 am

And the right-wing batshit brigade is already running with the story - everyone that does something awful must be a Muslim in their minds, reality doesn't count.

Since Ted Cruz made his very first campaign stop at an event sponsored by Jack Kimball,a conspiracy theorist and former head of the New Hampshire Republican Party who blogs about "government takeovers,immanent wars with foreign nations and UFO sightings") and his Conservative Business League of New Hampshire (Huffington Post/Politics),I'm sure we'll finally be subjected to this idiocy in the mainstream media. Can't wait for the "60 Minutes" segment.

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Titus pullo

3/28/2015 08:28:31 am

There are crazies on both sides of the political spectrum. I hate to ring up eugenics or some of the really crazy stuff from the left on forced diversity which is a lot scarer to me than some ufo nut. Then again it is New Hampshire where Breton woods is...perfect for global financial new world order consparicies...ha

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Mark L

3/28/2015 08:57:52 pm

More of this "everyone's as bad as each other" crap. "Forced diversity"? Firstly, you're just making something up, and secondly, that doesn't sound like it involves demonising and killing huge numbers of the world's population, as the political right seems insistent on doing with Muslims.

EP

3/28/2015 08:07:42 am

Cathleen, Shane was clearly alluding to Mike Bara's offensive claim (which he also quotes) in order to ridicule it.

Since I assume you read Jason's blog post, I can't explain why your problem is with Shane, rather than with Mike Bara.

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Cathleen Anderson

3/28/2015 03:51:29 pm

I did read Jason's post and missed that Shane was quoting. So yes my real problem is with Mike Bara and others like him.

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Crash55

3/28/2015 08:20:19 am

Jason,

Scott Reaney may be guilty of 2nd Degree Aggravated Harassment under NY State Law: http://law.onecle.com/new-york/penal/PEN0240.30_240.30.html

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Hypatia

3/28/2015 01:23:11 pm

I suspect he is also copying insults verbatim from some collection of 'insults for dummies' book or site.

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EP

3/28/2015 09:08:13 am

titus pullo never misses an opportunity to remind us that not all political idiocy comes from the right. Even when it is completely irrelevant to anything anyone is saying. And even though no one with half a brain cell needs to be told that.

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titus pullo

3/28/2015 09:52:58 am

Happy happy joy joy.....seriously my comment wasn't even worth a response just a statement as most posts tend to be more "right wing" stereotypes than left but that's fine..

I do agree with the view that mental illness isn't something to joke about in any way which Shane, Cathleen and yourself pointed out. I've seen it affect someone first hand when something their life was upended and they struggled to get structure again...modern society has many benefits but with all the technology is the downside..to me personally its large organizations..working for someone else when it is outside more traditional contracts for specific work is so against our normal humanism. I"m sure anyone working for a corporate gig understands..

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EP

3/28/2015 10:38:12 am

Just to clarify, I do not think that joking about mental illness is never permissible. That's not my problem with Mike Bara. My problem is that his comment displays not humor, but stubborn, arrogant ignorance and absence of intellectual scruples.

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Clint Knapp

3/28/2015 11:55:54 am

I was going to leave this one alone, but what the hell.

Even if there weren't already a mountain of evidence that Lubitz suffered from some form of illness he was hiding from his employer, how in the hell does crashing a plane into the side of a mountain in the French Alps constitute a jihad by any stretch of the word? Did the mountain wrong Islam somehow?

I can understand why Mannheimer jumped on it; anti-Islamic propaganda is his thing. But an ancient alien "theorist" jumping on the anti-Islam bandwagon just because it happened to be a crashed plane is by far the most stupid thing I've ever heard all week. Even after the toilet-tank float of the gods.

Mike Bara, you sir are a first class shitheel.

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Clint Knapp

3/28/2015 12:08:27 pm

Curse you, revision process. Should read:

"I can understand why Mannheimer jumped on it; anti-Islamic propaganda is his thing, and blaming anything that goes wrong with a plane on Muslims is par for the course these days."

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EP

3/28/2015 12:40:05 pm

Just blame Weebly, Clint, and no one will be the wiser ;)

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Hypatia

3/28/2015 02:06:18 pm

Yes, tell that paunchy plume-plucked malt-worm, and that other drooling flap-mouthed codpiece from Canada to onion-eye and dribble elsewhere than in your email box.

I think we all agree that Bara has crossed the line with his vile comments about depression. It is obvious to me that he has never had even a mild bout of depression and further, he has no close family member who has suffered with depression. IF he does have any family member who ever had/has depression, then he is one of the biggest asshats ever. Courtesy to Jason, it is his blog, prevents me from any further description of what I think about this Bara creature. I am at a loss for any polite terms to describe such a cold hearted, vile, disgusting creature without resorting to cursing.
That any of the numerous idiots, bigots, and assorted fools on the net have decided to say this pilot had converted to Islam and therefore, he took out the entire plane load of innocent people as he killed himself is no surprise. One can bet certain that cretins like Cruz among others in the US of A will also join in the "blame Muslims" for this disaster. Well of course, Islam and Muslims are the current "target of choice" in particular among those with zero functioning brain cells who mindlessly follow the "thread" that Islam is THE source of evil in this world. What a total crock of excrement that is. How easy it is for them to ignore the Crusades and the Inquisition and that is just for starters.
This is what we get when what passes for news has degraded into total crap, prime examples, Faux Noise, CNN, and ALL the other mainstream TV "news" channels. They are all equally guilty. Yes, there are as many bigots/nut cases on the left of the political spectrum as there are on the far right. The sad bit, my opinion, is there is no longer any middle ground. What passes as news, TV, radio, print, and even the net seems to not want any real discussion or common ground to talk things out.
As the world heads off the cliff, they all want to be the only source and we had best all follow them, or else. Sorry, but I refuse to follow any of them. The same applies, for me, with every religion, just fantasy/fairy tales and now propaganda from what passes as the left in the US as well as the right wing of the war party. In fact, my opinion, the US of A is NOT a two party system. What we do have are two wings of the war party. Basically they are just the two sides of the very same coin.
Bara should be taken to the wood shed for these comments. He has no idea, and most likely does not even care, how hurtful what he said is to those who do suffer with depression.

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Only Me

3/29/2015 05:06:02 am

Wow. I got hit with a stomach virus that almost forced me to go to the hospital Friday, so this is the first time I've been able to visit.

I see the post has the repulsive sub-human Mike Bara displaying his talent to take advantage of any opportunity to get his name in the spotlight. I also see his fellow repulsive sub-human Scott Reaney believes he can spin whatever lies he wants against Jason. Classy.

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EP

3/29/2015 02:03:54 pm

@ Shane Sullivan

Wait, is the Ainu thing another pearl from Bara? Because he sounds more and more like a straight-up racist. And here I was thinking he was just a dumb asshole...

By the way, the Ainu... not Caucasian. They have awesome mythology, though. Learning about it was one of the memorable experiences of my deprived childhood :)

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Shane Sullivan

3/29/2015 03:00:07 pm

It was from the link he posted on facebook.

The Caucasian thing was my cue to leave, so I didn't explore "Western Voices World News", but the name doesn't inspire confidence.

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EP

3/30/2015 03:06:16 am

Race traitor! ;)

Derek James Eunson

4/6/2015 02:25:29 am

Mike Bara has issues not only with Muslims and people who perhaps have suffered depression. He also has problems with homosexuals and women.
Ample evidence of Bara's shenannigans and vile behaviour can be found on both "Emoluments of Mars" and "Binaryspellbook Ranting" blogs.

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I'm an author and editor who has published on a range of topics, including archaeology, science, and horror fiction. There's more about me in the About Jason tab.